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[APRIL 7, 1906. 




















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In the Lodges of the Blackfeet. 
XIX.—Nat-ah’-ki’s Wedding. 
At daylight an unusual stir and confusion in 
camp awoke us, and Nat-ah’-ki went out to learn 
what it was all about. She soon returned with 
the news that our enemy of the night had proved 
to be Crows, that the bodies of seven of them 
had been found, and that they had succeeded in 
running off seventy or more horses. A large 
party had already started in pursuit of them, and 
we were not to break camp until they returned. 
I arose and dressed betimes, had breakfast and 
went visiting. Turning into Weasel Tail’s lodge 
I found him nursing a gash in the thigh, where 
a Crow bullet had creased him. I sat with him 
a long time, while other visitors came and went. 
All were calling the Crows any bad name their 
language contained, but unfortunately or fortu- 
nately, some may say, in this line their speech 
was exceedingly limited. The very best they could 
do was to call their enemy dog faces and present 
them to the Sun, begging him to destroy them. 
I went on to the lodge of the chief, where | 
found many of the principal men assembled. “I 
for one,” Big Lake was saying when I entered, 
“Will talk against making peace with the Crows 
so long as I live. Let us all agree never to smoke 
their tobacco. Let us teach our children that 
they are like the rattlesnake, always to be killed 
on sight.” 
The visitors heartily agreed to this, and I may 
say here that they kept their werd, sending party 
after party against their Yellowstone enemies 
until the Government interfered and put a stop 
to inter-tribal war. The last raid occurred in the 
summer of 1885. 
There was much scalp dancing during the day, 
participated in by those who had lost most re- 
cently husband or father or some other relative 
in battle with the Crows. This was not, as has 
been often luridly pictured, a spectacular dance 
of fierce exultation and triumph over the death 
of their enemy. As performed by the Blackfeet, 
it was a truly sad spectacle. Those participating 
in it blackened their faces, hands and moccasins 
with charcoal, and wore their meanest, plainest 
clothes. An aged man held the scalp of the 
enemy tied to a willow wand in front of him, and 
the others ranged in line on each side. Then 
they sang a low and very plaintive song in a 
minor key, which to me at least, seemed to ex- 
press more sorrow over the loss of their kin than 
it did joy for the death of the enemy. On this 
occasion there were seven scalps, seven parties 
dancing in different parts of camp at once, and 
one band of mourners after another took their 
turn, so that the performance lasted until night. 
There was really no dancing about it, the singers 
merely stooping slightly and rising in time to 
the song. 
The pursuing party returned at dusk, having 
failed to overtake the enemy. Some were for 
starting at once on a raid into the Crow country, 
but there was now little ammunition in camp 
and it was decided that we should push on to 
Fort Benton with as little delay as possible. After 
obtaining a good supply of powder and ball there 
the war ‘party could turn back southward. Four 
or five days later camp was pitched in the big 
bottom opposite the fort, Nat-ah’-ki and I crossed 
the river, and wended our way to the little adobe 
house. There we found Berry, his wife and 
mother, and the good Crow Woman. What a 
happy lot they were those women, as they bustled 
around and got in each other’s way trying to get 
supper ready. And I am sure Berry and I were 
happy too. We did not say much as we stretched 
out on a buffalo robe lounge and smoked, but 
words are often superfluous. It was all good 
enough for us, and each knew that the other so 
felt. Berry had got my mail out of the office and 
there it lay on the table, a few letters, a bushel or 
more of papers and magazines. I read the let- 
ters, but the rest mostly remained unopened. I 
had lost all interest in States affairs. 
In the evening Berry and I went down to the 
fort for a while, and, of course, we called in at 
Keno Bill’s place. As usual, at that time of year, 
the town, if it could be so called, was full of peo- 
ple, traders and trappers, bullwhackers and mule 
skinners, miners and Indians, all awaiting the 
arrival of the steamboats which had long since 
left St. Louis, and were soon due to arrive. 
Every table in Keno’s place was so crowded with 
players that one couldn’t edge in to watch a 
game. Keno himself and two assistants were 
busy behind the bar, as the kegs still held out de- 
spite the heavy draught on them during the win- 
ter months. There were even a few bottles of 
beer left. I gladly paid a dollar and four bits 
for one of them, and Berry helped me drink it. 
We went into the Overland Hotel for a mo- 
ment on our way home, and there among other 
guests I saw a man whom I thought to be a 
preacher; at any rate, a white tie adorned his 
blue flannel shirt front, and he wore a black coat 
which, if not cut in approved ministerial style, 
was at least of the right color. I went up to 
him and said: ‘Excuse me, sir, but I’d like to 
know if you are a preacher?” 
“T am,’ he replied with a pleasant smile. “I 
am a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church. 
I have been in the mountains for the past year, 
both preaching and mining, and am now on my 
_way to my home in the States.” 
“Well,” I continued, “if you'll go along with 
me I guess I can find a job for you.” 
He arose at once and accompanied us home. 
“May I ask,’ he said on the way, “what is to 
be the nature of my services? A baptism or 
marriage, or is there some sick one in need of a 
few words?” 
Ni | 
uh 
about me, saying: 



“Tt’s a marriage,’ I replied; “that is, providing 
the other. party is willing.” 
With that Berry shamelessty snickered. 
The women were gaily talking and laughing 
when we arrived, but became silent at once when 
they saw our companion. They were always thus 
in the presence cf strangers, I called Nat-ah’-ki 
into the back room. “He out there,’ I said to 
her, “is a sacred (more correctly Sun) white 
man. I have asked him to sacredly marry us.” 
“Oh,” she cried. “How did you know my 
wish? It is what I have always wanted you to 
do, but I—I was afraid, ashamed to ask it of you. 
But, is he a real sacred white man? He wears 
no black robe, no cross?” 
“He is of another society,” I replied. “There 
are a thousand of them, and each claims that 
theirs is the only true one. It matters not to us. 
Come on.” 
And so, Berry acting as interpreter, we were 
married, and we sent the preacher forth with a 
gold piece as a souvenir of the occasion. “I’m 
hungry,” said Berry, “broil us a couple of buffalo 
tongues, you women.” 
Broiled tongue and bread, tea and apple sauce 
comprised the wedding feast, as we may call it, 
and that also was good enough for us. 
“Tt is this,’ Nat-ah’-ki confided to me later. 
“Many white men who have married women of 
our tribe according to our customs, have used 
them only as playthings and then have left them. 
But those who took women by the sacred words 
of a sacred white man, have never left them. I 
know that you would never leave me, no never. 
But how the others have laughed at me, joked 
‘Crazy girl, you love your 
man, and you are a fool; he has not married you 
in the white man’s way, and will leave you as 
soon as he sees another woman with a prettier 
face. They can never say that again. No, 
never.” 
We had planned, Berry and I, to remain in 
Fort Benton during the summer and make a 
camp trade the following winter. The steam- 
boats began to arrive in May and then the levee 
was a busy place. The traders were also rushed, 
the Indians crowding in to dispose of the last 
of their robes and furs. But we had no place 
in this, and in a few weeks we became restless. 
Berry decided to make a couple of trips to 
Helena with his bull train, although it was not 
necessary for him to go, as he had hired a train 
master, or, in the language of the bullwhacker, 
a “wagon boss.” The women decided that they 
wanted to go berrying. The Piegans had long 
since crossed the river and were camped on the 
Teton, only a few miles away. We proposed to 
join them, Nat-ah’-ki sending word to her 
mother to have our saddle and pack horses 
driven in. 
A couple of weeks before this, I was sitting on 
the levee one day when a stranger came along 
